


Alea Iacta Est

by bohemiantea



Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Epistolary, Established Relationship, F/F, Inquisitor as conqueror, Love Letters
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-05
Updated: 2019-04-25
Packaged: 2019-09-07 19:14:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,915
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16859776
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bohemiantea/pseuds/bohemiantea
Summary: 63 is still a fine age to still be adventuring or at least serving as a tedious cousin's bodyguard at the Conclave, but Abigail Trevelyan had planned on retiring soon with her lover. Now she raises and directs armies to set Thedas to rights, and only Hélène sees her emotional side.("Alea iacta est" = "the die is cast." Suetonius attributes this phrase to Julius Caesar as he was crossing the Rubicon January 10th 49 B.C. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alea_iacta_est )More tags will be added as this work is added to.





	1. Chapter 1

**10th day of Verimensis, the Temple of Sacred Ashes at Haven**

_My dearest  Hélène,_

_i am freezing my tits off. The Frostback Mountains are even colder than anticipated and I wish I had one of your lambswool shifts. Nights are a trial. I am busy enough during the day the cold is a nuisance instead of the misery it’s becoming this evening. I may beg you to send one if this Conclave grinds on as long as I suspect it will._

_Abelard, sadly, is just one of many blowhards braying to the Mothers about what should be done. The war between mages and templars has finally pushed into our sacred, noble realm and disrupted tea._

_Forgive me the heavy irritation – my cousin is a tiresome pedant, convinced the Trevelyan name means something to the Chantry aside from a Knight-Commander, a scholar, four sisters, and generous tithing. He might be right, but we join other noble families with similar claimants on both sides, and all of us are smarting._

_Meanwhile, I overheard a few stories of what happened to the mages in Kirkwall and they beggar belief. If they are true, I can’t repeat them to you. They will give you worse nightmares than the Blight had. If even a fraction of them are true, our templars have violated a sacred duty that can’t be forgiven. Not by me, anyway._

_I hope your sister remains safe near Ostwick. I regret I couldn’t do more to help her. Perhaps this Conclave will have to do, and so I endure Abelard’s plodding and whining as well as the terrible accommodations. I thought my days in tents were over. I should have known better as soon as I agreed to join his entourage._

_Some Grey Wardens arrived today. Strange bunch. They hardly interacted with anyone save the clerks and porters who could tell them where to go. I find their presence odd. Will they be recruiting? Or did the Divine invite their opinion? Or perhaps they hope to petition the Divine for more mages in their ranks. Our Knight-Commander cousin has complained before about sending his charges to the Wardens. The oaf doesn’t realize how effective magic is against the darkspawn. I am still grateful to your sister for that._

_I wonder if all Grey Wardens are so grim and focused? I suppose I will find out tomorrow. I’ve errands to finish after I seal this letter, and then dinner and a cot for me. Would that you were here and could keep me warm._

_Yours,_

_Abby_

* * *

Abigail straightened with a twinge at her lower back, corking the ink bottle and wiping her quill on a rag. The bells had finished tolling seven at least five minutes ago. She could take Hélène’s letter to the runners for dispatch in the morning, check on Abelard, and then get a bowl of dinner. Most likely the stew made for the guards and mercenaries encamped with their households and affiliations in regimented and segregated lines outside the Temple.

Most of the mercs, guards, or templars weren’t quite sure what to make of Abigail. She wedged herself into their company easily enough, but the confusion on their faces when they realized - especially after particularly lewd jokes - she was old enough to be either their mother or grandmother was comical. The others were smart enough to have figured it out and defaulted to deference, uncertain what powerful name or mercenary company she represented.

“Trevelyan” really just represented herself, regardless of what Abelard thought. Her only mission here was to keep her cousin from getting too embroiled in something he couldn’t fix. Settling this war could mean a sea change for the Chantry, and anyone at the forefront would be affected first. Abigail meant to get in front of those shifting waves and secure her remaining years with Hélène.

Closing and sealing her letter as fast as habit would allow, she left the niche she’d ensconced herself in and went directly to the runners. Two were visibly napping, probably preparing for a long night of shuttling dueling interests back and forth. 

“For the morning run down the mountain.” She handed her letter to a longhaired and grizzled courier, who grunted acknowledgment. “Bound for Ostwick.”

“Another for your sweetheart?” 

“Aye. Should I spare some of my tongue for your wife as well?” she grinned.

“You don’t sound like me, she’d twig soon enough,” he snorted. “A good evening, your Ladyship.”

 _Ladyship._  As if that wasn’t the joke of the Free Marches for the past 20 years, at least. The youngest Trevelyan, a knockabout adventurer and onetime lay sister, was going to marry one woman who would never inherit any titles or lands like Abigail’s peers would. Abby would never be a Lady, in that sense.

“Thanks, Evram. See you on the morrow.” 

Another cold evening on this Maker-forsaken mountain. Well, the camp kitchen was on the way toward Abelard’s room at the Temple. She could pick up food for two and if Abelard didn’t want his share, perhaps she’d find a Grey Warden instead. They could exchange a story or two about darkspawn and traveling the most miserable roads between here and Ostwick. Maybe she could barter better armor. The dented scouting pauldrons were a bad choice out here and she could use better gambeson. That is, if they deigned to speak. Their room was somewhere in the Temple, she’d just go find it.


	2. Chapter 2

**15th of Verimensis, Haven**

Dearest Hélène,

Please ignore every rumor you hear from this day forward and remember that I love you very much. I would not have left you in so much doubt, so understand I would have written to you sooner but physically could not. Even now I do not feel fully myself. 

It’s my unfortunate trial to explain the inexplicable. Divine Justinia has been murdered, and the hole in the sky her taunting memorial. You will hear many conflicting reports of my role in this. I beg you: believe absolutely none of it, particularly anything to uplift me alongside her or Andraste. I have been granted some strange… I don’t know what to call it other than magic. A magic tool, I believe I will call it. It has the power to close smaller demon-spewing tears in the countryside. A blessing Abelard did not survive to see this. He would be apoplectic over my evident apostasy.

Maker save me, I still sound delirious. Before my last letter, which I now believe has not and will never reach you - ahh, those poor couriers! - I would have demanded that you not believe any of this obvious drivel either. But as I have emphasized to you before, I must believe the evidence of my senses above what the Chantry teaches. Something untoward has happened to me and to the Conclave, and someone is directly to blame. The mark on my hand is able to set some things to rights - I have seen and directed this personally.

More than that? I cannot trust. Those I am with, also inexplicably the Right and Left Hands of the Divine, cannot trust me just as I do not trust them, and yet we must trust each other if anything is to be done. As I have yet to resist a challenge, and I have the only fitting tool, never fear that I  _will_  do something. Put away your consternation and remember your delight, Hélène - my will to do brought us together, did it not? It will reunite us as well.

Oh, fuck these demons.

Ever yours,

Abigail


	3. Chapter 3

Abigail pushed into Sister Leliana’s tent, furious.

“Out,” she told the scout standing at the Sister’s elbow. He froze, glancing from Abigail to the Sister and back.

“Give us fifteen minutes, then report back,” she said in her soft Orlesian accent, faintly scowling at Abigail. It reminded Abby of Hélène and kept her anger stoked. The scout only nodded before fleeing.

“You dare read my letters,” Abigail hissed, advancing forward a few paces. She saw the other woman’s hands go behind her back. “Keep your hands where I can see them,  _bard_.”

“I am not a bard,” she replied with disdain. “Talk to Varric if you want stories.” But she withdrew her hands and placed them on the makeshift table in front of her.

“I do already, and he’s been very forthright about being a liar. But you? Have laid a pretty bed of lies in front of me and expected me to thank you for laying in it all unknowing.”

“And what do you think I have lied to you about, hmm? Why cannot I say the same for you as well? Nearly everyone who could vouch for you is dead.” The Sister shakes her head, eyes narrowed. “But it is just as I told Cassandra: we need you to seal the Breach. Just because you have been eliminated as its cause does not absolve you completely.”

“So, you go through my letters,  _spymaster_? Hoping to find some other nefarious plot?” Hélène’s letter -  _21st of Wintermarch_  - burned at her breast. Abigail had seen the courier arrive yesterday and had not known she’d received anything until finding the letter at her desk today. Eagerness of news, of reassurances, had temporarily overwhelmed her sense until she’d finished reading.

> _Rumors have spread like plague, just as you warned me. There is fascination and disgust alike with the fabled “Herald of Andraste,” and none of the outlandish stories sound like you at all. That has not stopped the others who knew of your departure to Haven to inquire about you. Some have assumed your death and ask if I will go to retrieve your ashes. Others ask if there is a chance you were not at the temple at all. For now I remain silent and tell them I do not know, but I worry what will happen to us the day I must reveal the truth. What will happen to you? Will my Sisters or a layperson discover a new-found ambition through claimed knowledge of the Herald? Manipulate you through me? I know not what this Inquisition plans, but it should not be held hostage because of us._

“I’ve seen enough bard’s work to know you all would gladly tear apart families and ruin lives for your patrons,” Abigail continued. “I saw good friends ruined during the  _Orlesian_  occupation.” Her lip curled.

“You hear my accent and think to know all there is of me,  _Lady Trevelyan?_  I used to be a bard, but not anymore specifically for the reasons you state. I gave up that life to be Divine Justinia’s Left Hand, but if I could take it up once more in exchange for her life, I would.” Leliana removed her hands from the table, watching Abigail steadily and bitterly. “So yes, your letters have been read. Congratulations on your love, who has not abandoned you and displays more sense than you do right now.”

“ _Sense?_  You think I rail at you due to pride? I am here because I believe she is right and you put her in danger! How many of your people see this–” Abigail flung a hand at the scattered contents of the tent, a few papers rustling in the air that blew around the edges of the canvas. “–how many can simply walk in here, pick up a missive, and leave without your knowing?”

That stilled Leliana, who regarded Abigail measuredly.

“I would have said none, especially since this is in plain sight of the Chantry. I chose this spot in the center for many good reasons. But while we are looking for suspects and there is still chaos to sort… you are correct and I apologize.”

Abigail exhaled. “Good. Apology accepted. I am well aware of your role here. Hard decisions must be made. But if you think to expose me, you also weaken me and this role I must fulfill. You put other good people at risk.”

“I agree. I have some connections who will be glad to look after Hélène and keep her safe, if you like.” Leliana’s stance was much more relaxed, though her glance still wary. “We can give out the news of your… status… in such a way as to make it clear she is under some powerful protection.”

“Only if you personally have the political means.” Abigail shook her head. There were some she could think to ask, but only in normal circumstances. Now? With the Chantry itself in upheaval, many fortunes could be won and lost a thousand times until a stabilizing force took hold. “Seizing hold of this title is premature and frankly unnerving.”

“Unnerving?” Leliana raised an eyebrow. “You are Andrastian?”

“As are the rest of my family, though they are the Templars and scribes and money purses. My own faith is…”  _Hard won. A trial. Has been tested._  “…private.”

“I see.” She pursed her mouth. “A time may come when we may need to exploit this title all the same. Trust me when I say I would not relish it, but would still advise it if it gains us the resources and knowledge we seek.”

“I see,” Abigail echoed wryly. “Glad to know where we stand.”

“As am I.” Sister Leliana and Abigail eye each other; Abby is reminded of circling, sniffing cats. The younger woman flashed a quick grin. “Orlesian occupation? Don’t tell me you, a noble from a Free Marcher family, fought in the Ferelden Rebellion.”

“You know, Orlesians tend to say the same thing. I smile and give them a little wolf howl before plundering the smoked trout,” Abigail said, and left the tent.

* * *

**25th of Verimensis**

_Beloved Hélène,_

_You and I know how the Maker has tested my faith these long years, and it seems it is not yet at an end. More than cold chills my bones in these Maker-forsaken mountains: this mark on my hand, possible threats to you. The paroxysms of joy and revulsion the rest of my family will indulge in publicly, knowing Abigail, of all people, is Andraste’s chosen._

_Consider that I could have told Abelard to find someone else to accompany him. This is the thought I come back to. And yet the tragedy would still have occurred, and someone else might have had to gather his ashes to return to the family crypt. Would there even be another person? Can I say for certain that someone else could have survived with this mark on their hand? That I cannot lets in room for doubt though I abhor it: I cannot be chosen, a hapless recipient of Divine blessing. For what purpose?_

_I look about me and see people needing guidance, a restoration of faith and hope. They came here wanting peace and reconciliation between factions I fear could be irrevocably shattered. But what if that is not the case? What if I have been chosen to bring peace?_

_Chilled, Hélène. I am absolutely chilled and, since my recovery, I have sometimes looked to the peace of the bottle to soothe my sleep. Hessarian’s doubts are now my own. I seek liberation. Kevesh, benefaris._

_All of my love,_

_Abby_

_Post-script: My advisors think it might be possible to sway the Chantry Mothers to support us. We begin with Mother Giselle, who treats the wounded in Ferelden’s Hinterlands. I will try to send another letter before we go, but you may not hear from me for a while. I will be fine and you, I am told, will be protected. Tell the Sisters of me or not, I leave it in your sweet, long hands. Remember our kisses in the grotto and the starlight that showed the way to salvation._


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> https://bohemiantea-scorpiocoffee.tumblr.com/post/184400171501/we-could-travel-flee-to-antiva-and-live

_“We could travel. Flee to Antiva and live penniless but happy lives in Hercinia.” Looking over Hélène’s languid beauty in her bed that was bought with mercenary gold in Val Chevin._

_“And leave Colette at our father’s mercy?” Hélène staring with her beautiful brown eyes before rising, pulling dignity about her like a cloak. “I cannot abandon my sister. She must go to a Circle, my love. Let me at least choose one to accompany her in faith.”_

_Breath caught. “You don’t mean it. You will promise yourself to the Chantry?”_

_Hélène strokes her face sadly. “My love. I do. Please help us.”_

“I can’t believe you people can sleep on these things,” Varric grumbled behind her. “I’ve had easier rides tied up in a boat.”

“I can make that happen again,” Cassandra said.

“Careful, Seeker, I think you’re starting to like it.”

“Can you two shut up for one moment?” Abigail said, opening her eyes. 

She hadn’t been sleeping – not like she used to be able to, even on a swaybacked nag like this one. Just resting her eyes and remembering the softest bed she’d ever had. So many nights now spent on hard, cold soil was murder on her hips, which created terrible hard knots in her back. There was only so much stretching and conditioning she could do to alleviate them. Tonics, magic, and a proper bed was what she desperately needed.

Too bad the fighting in the Hinterlands was going to prevent her from getting them for who knows how long. Until she broke through it to find this Mother Giselle, it was going to be a headache-inducing misery.

“I believe the Inquisition camp is not far ahead,” Solas interjected. “If I remember our map correctly.” She glanced over at him; the mage seemed fed up with the sniping as well, though he had barely said a word about it.

“I hope so because I’ve had enough tortures for the day,” Abigail said with a grimace.

“I apologize,” Cassandra began stiffly. ”I believe we may all be tired from our journeys.” Abigail did not miss the Seeker’s “we.” She grunted in reply.

“Be that as it may,” Abigail said, “let’s not alert hostiles in the region before we are cut off from allies, hmm?” She turned in the saddle and fixed her eyes significantly on Varric before addressing Cassandra again. “Let us pretend we have the order in our ranks we wish to restore.”

“I’m game if you are, Seeker,” Varric said. She could hear the irrepressible ass grinning.

“Ugh.”

Abigail agreed with Cassandra. She was also going to get him working on her back tonight. At least it would keep him quiet and give Solas a break.

* * *

**_6th of Pluitanis_ **

_Hélène,_

_Do you remember Val Chevin? I am reminded of it often, especially now that we are on foot to flush out the renegades plaguing_

“Didn’t take you for a writer.”

Abigail winced and hissed as Varric’s hands found the worst knot three quarters of the way down her back. She tried not to snap the quill and steadied herself on the log, shaking off Solas’s raised eyebrow.

“Sorry. Shoulda got Chuckles again.”

“You’re an archer,” she said shortly. “Crossbow be damned–”

“Bianca, don’t listen to her.”

“–you know where the muscles pull.” Abigail twisted her head to side-eye the dwarf. He was awkwardly sympathetic, resting his hands on his knees. “And strong hands.”

“Hey now,” Varric said, raising them, “I’m spoken for.”

“As am I and you’re not my type.”

“Oh ho, she does smile! Now I’m curious,” Varric said with the same tilt of his head he’d leveled at the Seeker when Abigail first met him. “Who plucks your bowstrings?”

“That is a terribly private thing to ask,” Cassandra said from across the campfire. She sat leaning forward, elbows on her thighs.

“Just making friendly conversation with the lady asking me to put my hands on her,” Varric retorted. “You could do the same, you know.”

“ _What?_  I don’t–”

“Conversation, Lady Seeker,” Solas said. “Although I suspect you are more the Herald’s ‘type’, as he put it.” His tone was dry but he wore a faint smile.

“Still taken, shit-stirrers,” Abigail said as Cassandra flushed. “And if you ever want to learn more, you can get back to working on those knots.”

“I can still be of assistance if you simply show me–” Solas began.

“Varric, you point. Solas, you… What you do. And Cassandra, for the love of the Maker please put me out if these two can’t figure it out or so help me I will be begging demons to wrench my back.”

Cassandra frowned. “It is that bad?”

“I wouldn’t be telling you if it wasn’t,” Abigail said, corking the ink bottle.

“You should have told us earlier.” Cassandra’s frown deepened to a scowl and she stood up. “We have some healing supplies.”

“And wounded and frightened people who need them more,” Abigail snapped. “I am not frail, Seeker Pentaghast.”

“I did not say you were,” she replied coolly. “But you are compromised and the wounded may die if we cannot get through to them.” She turned and disappeared into her tent.

“She’s got you there, Marcher,” Varric said. She heard a loud series of cracks and a murmured, “Varric,  _please_ ,” from Solas; the dwarf had popped his knuckles.

“Marcher?” Abigail folded her barely-begun letter with a sigh. Later. Once again. “You’re a Kirkwaller.”

“Yeah, so? ‘Ostwick’ is too stuffy,” Varric said. “And the way you talk sometimes, I figure you’ve done your share of ‘freelancing’ and marching. That kind of shit.” He put both hands above her waist. “We doing this or what?”

“Do it.” Abigail clenched her jaw as he poked and pried at the muscle tissue, Solas humming thoughtfully as he watched. She dropped her head and waited for some relief.

“It will go easier if you use this.” Cassandra’s boots appeared beside her, and then a small jar. The sharp smell of liniment followed soon after. Abigail lifted her head.

Cassandra cleared her throat, expression softened into tentative apology. “My own supply. I do not ache nearly so often.”

“Andraste bless you.” She felt the tingle of magic as Solas did something that loosened one of the knots, and exhaled in relief. “Both of you.”

“Aww, Marcher…”

“Use the liniment and I’ll bless you too, Varric.”

“I’m touched.”

“You  _wish_ ,” she said, and got a small symphony of huffed laughter in reply.

* * *

**_7th of Pluitanis_ **

_Please forgive me,  my love, for writing so hastily. You deserve more from me, but for now all I have are words, and only poor ones._

_Rogue templars and rogue mages have made a thorough, miserable mess of the Hinterlands. I cannot find any sympathy in me for either. Vile opportunists have burned and pillaged so much, the people have been starving and with little in the way of healing herbs. The only things they will accept since they are understandably afraid of any offering other healing arts._

_There was also an enclave of idiot cultists. Discovered this when trying to fetch herbs and supplies and potion for weak-lung. Worshipping a rift, of all the daft heresies I’ve ever heard. I should have hauled the lot of them by the ear to Mother Giselle, who has more sense in her head than the Chancellor determined to see me in chains. Instead I only dragged one back to his family where he belonged and closed the rift._

_Fortunate for them the Seeker, the apostate, and the dwarf eased my back. I might have let the demons eat a few of them as a lesson. Instead they will be singing the praises of the Herald of Andraste and the Inquisition to all who listen._

_Rank, terrible heresy, my love. But I will use it to right these wrongs._

 

 


End file.
